Update's finished! I'll add footnotes later.
Part Seventy-Nine: Oriental Happenings
Asian Immigration:
East Asians have been migrating to the Americas in large numbers for nearly one and a half centuries. While Filipinos began arriving in the Spanish colonies in Ibero-America in the 16th century, other East Asians did not start coming to the Americas for the most part until the 19th century. As Japan, Korea, and China opened to the west, contract workers from these countries traveled with the ships going from Asia across the Pacific and settling in the Americas. In the United States, most East Asian immigrants settled in Champoeg, Oregon, and Fremont and worked on the railroads extending along the Pacific and toward the Rockies. Additionally, a few thousand Chinese and Filipino immigrants also settled in Cuba before the National War and worked on the sugar plantations. By the end of the 19th century there were almost 40,000 Asians in the United States, mostly from Korea and China.
However, the United States was not the only North American country to receive Asian immigration during the 19th century. Throughout the later 19th century, many Asians migrated to California. Most of these migrants entered the country through San Diego or Zhenbao in Yerba Buena. The majority of the 80,000 Asians[1] who had come to California by 1900 worked on the railroads or the mines in the interior of the country at some point. Almost 50,000 of the Asians who had come to California were Chinese, with almost all of these coming from the southern provinces. Another 20,000 arrived in California from the Philippines, and would attract further Filipino immigration to California in the 20th century. The few Japanese that moved to California primarily settled in the Californian portion of the Hawaiian islands.
Sino-Korean War:
For over two hundred years, the Qing Dynasty ruled China. But in the 19th century, the Qing began to wane as unrest in China and foreign intervention undermined the royalty in Beijing. The 1850s saw a revolt in what is now Dzungaria. Hui, Uighur, and Dzungar peoples in western Xinjiang rose up and created the short-lived state of Kashgaria[2]. They resisted the efforts of the Qing to recapture the far western provinces for over ten years and for a time had aid from other Central Asian tribes and even Russia. However, further troubles were to face the Qing dynasty later in the century when the Korean Peninsula rebelled against Chinese subjugation.
In 1885, the pro-western reformer Kim Ok-gyun[3] used his influence over King Gojong to end the tributes paid by Korea to the Qing. On Kim's advice, Gojong soon rebelled against the Chinese and began the Sino-Korean War as China fought to reassert its dominance over the peninsula. The French soon joined in the war and sent a portion of their navy to assist the Koreans. With French assistance, the Korean army helped push back the Chinese invasion. The furthest Chinese advance reached Yongbyon in September of 1885 before being repelled by Korean and French riflemen. A month later, the bulk of the Chinese fleet had been defeated at Dandong and the French had landed troops on Hainan. The war lasted into the spring of 1887. By the time of the peace negotiations, Hainan had been occupied by France with several southern ports bombarded while the Korean army had reached Yingkou and had landed an army at Dongying.
The Treaty of Namp'o was signed to end the Sino-Korean War in April of 1887. King Gojong pressed for hard terms on the Chinese to make up for centuries of Korea's tributary status. Gojong was supported by France, who wanted to secure significant territory in East Asia and gain trade concessions. With rebellion brewing in the western provinces again as well as in the south, Beijing had to accept the negotiations. Under the Treaty of Namp'o, Korea received the Liaodong Peninsula as well as Taiwan and the treaty port of Fuzhou. France received the Changshan Islands, Hainan, and the port cities of Yantai, Xiamen and Guangzhou. The concessions made by the Chinese to open up treaty ports led to several other nations forcing China to open other ports to them in the coming decades.
[1] The total of around 120,000 Asians coming to the US and California is about on par with OTL; the 1900 census shows about 100,000 Asians in the US at the time.
[2] A short-lived state led by
Yakub Beg.
[3] An OTL pro-western advisor to King Gojong.